


For she walks the road with thee

by LunaRowena



Series: Watcher Calendula [1]
Category: Pillars of Eternity
Genre: Deadfire Spoilers, F/F, Femslash February, Other, priest of berath
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:54:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22641409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaRowena/pseuds/LunaRowena
Summary: All things cycle onward, but she yet lives. And where does Berath live but in all the spaces between? In every doorway, in every dusk, in every wheel that circles round? How can she help but praise her god that carries them all forward? How can she help but yearn for their voice, their touch?
Relationships: The Watcher/Berath (Pillars of Eternity), The Watcher/Xoti (Pillars of Eternity)
Series: Watcher Calendula [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1533680
Comments: 11
Kudos: 16





	For she walks the road with thee

**Author's Note:**

> The lines throughout are from Berathian Scripture, from the game.

_Behold, thou faithful, the visage of thy transformation._

She comes to her faith through books and a fascination with liminality.

Young Cal lies on the floor of her father’s library, flipping through page after page. Her father is a practical man, a merchant business does not run itself, so there is not much fiction to be found here. Florinda may complain, but it is fine for Calendula. Why does she need fictional tales when there are so many interesting things to find in reality? Descriptions of far away places, morality, philosophy, scripture.

Especially scripture.

She reads about the strength of Galawain, the mercy of Eothas, the love of Hylea. 

The duality of Berath.

Berath. Cirono. Rikuhu. Kohopa and Tangaloa. Bewnen i Ankew and Ankew i Bewnen. Caoth i Bhád and Bád i Caothaí. The Usher and the Pallid Knight.

Forever they cycle. Death in life and life in death. They are two and yet one, guardian of the Wheel. Of the door to life and the door to death.

Perhaps it is blasphemous, but the Pallid Knight is the one that catches her interest. A woman in armor with a greatsword, roaming Eora to collect the souls that have tarried for too long. She plays as her sometimes, swinging a large stick, returning lost souls to the Wheel.

“It is not good for a young girl to be so concerned with death,” her grandmother says.

Her mother shrugs. “It’s a phase. She’ll grow out of it.”

No, Cal thinks. She has not yet grown into it.

_Fear not the journey when the portal opens._

Cal kneels, reciting the scripture of Berath over and over. A penitence, the Father says. She must learn calm. She must be stoic, rational. For what is death but the most rational, most natural thing in the world?

People have expectations for the clergy of Berath and she does not meet them. Her passion for her god burns too brightly. She is too quick, too loud, too alive.

“We must let go of the world, not become too attached, for all things cycle onward,” the Father says.

All things cycle onward, but she yet lives. And where does Berath live but in all the spaces between? In every doorway, in every dusk, in every wheel that circles round? How can she help but praise her god that carries them all forward? How can she help but yearn for their voice, their touch?

“Be less, Calendula. Berath seeks dispassion.”

If the only way to find what she longs for is to stop longing, what else can she do?

_Become one with the Wheel with glad heart and cheerful countenance._

This is not the first time she has sat with the dying. She is a new Cal. She is calm. She is quiet. She faces her duty with detachment.

The old man wheezes, every breath becoming more and more labored. She wipes his brow. The end is coming. It comes for them all in the end. There is no stopping, no drawing out of time.

Soon they shall prepare his body for burial. His body will be an empty husk they lay in the ground; his family will weep. Cal will not weep. How can she weep for a soul that is now free? That walks with Berath? That will come to life anew?

Maybe she is not so detached. But she tries.

_For the doorway shall open for all in their time._

It is a long way from Ixamitl to the Dyrwood, but they have heard disturbing reports from their brothers in Gilded Vale. Religious purges. The death of a god. Children without souls. What can have happened for the cycle to break down?

“It will be good for you,” they say, “To meet more of our brethren.”

The truth, she thinks, is that they still don’t know what to do with her. Even a priest of Berath is not supposed to long for the embrace of death. But she shall face this journey with satisfaction. She shall step into a new phase of her life, and who better to shepherd this passage than Berath?

_Neither the rich nor influential, neither kings nor rulers, neither the strong nor powerful can escape its embrace._

She has died and she yet lives. Part of her mourns that she is yet in this world. The other part rejoices for the blessing she has been given. She can see souls. Speak with them. Guide them. Cal knows she has finally found her calling. Who better to speak for the dead than a priest of Berath?

_Berath will usher thee through the doorway and thou willst return to life, thy mortal life begun anew._

Berath does not often speak to their followers. Their followers are supposed to know their purpose, to carry out their duty solemnly.

So as Cal stands in Teir Evron and prays to Berath, she does not expect much.

“Return them to the Wheel,” a voice whispers around her, neither male nor female.

Her god has spoken. She must follow.

When she returns, it is more than she could have dreamed. The Usher and the Pallid Knight. The Pallid Knight stands passive, her black hair in sharp contrast to her milky skin. In all of Cal’s dreams, she has never come close.

Her god speaks to her about the cycle of life, death, and rebirth. Cal hangs onto the words that drip from the Pallid Knight’s lips like water off a stone. She must stop Thaos. Return the souls to the cycle. What else could she possibly do, but to continue the nature of the world?

She is favored by her god. She is in ecstasy.

_There goest the cycle. There goest life. There thou goest also._

The gods are not real.

No.

_No._

NO.

The gods are real. They may be constructed by kith, but they are real. She has seen them, spoke with them. They drive the destinies of kith. Power the cycle onward. Cal thinks of the Pallid Knight’s eyes, black pools that the universe itself could get lost in.

She did not turn her back on her gods before, in the past life. She will not do so now.

She wipes Thaos's memories and returns his soul to the Wheel. He will not escape the cycle any longer. Everyone must return in the end.

She returns the souls to the Wheel where they belong.

No one must know of this. She cannot betray them. The favored of Berath can not let them down.

_Thou shalt approach the door, the inevitable shall approach thee._

She is dead, or as close to dead as can be. And that means she stands in front of her god. The Usher leads her in. The Pallid Knight reads her fate. Cal watches her hands, pale, skin stretched across the bone. Cold.

She wonders if Berath knows. If this is why she was chosen. Chosen as a Watcher, chosen as the Hound of Eothas. If Berath knows of the passion that burns so deeply within her. The feelings she is not supposed to feel. She wonders if Berath knows, and can accept her as she is.

They have need of her again. They will make her their Herald. She has longed to meet Berath, but if in living she will see them more, she will live. Cal will sail to the ends of Eora if she can see their face again.

_Do not turn back on the portal, do not turn back on new life._

Cal sees her from a distance, the green clad priestess with the lantern. She’s just a woman, just another follower of Eothas gathered in the Deadfire. But even as Cal sees her, she knows this woman means something.

It has always been a subject of religious debate, where the duties of Berath end and those of Eothas begin. How distinct is rebirth from Berath’s control of the cycle? And this priestess, this Xoti, follows the other aspect of Eothas, that of the downward cycle, of death itself.

As Xoti holds up her lantern, Cal feels as though she understands Xoti better than any of the Dawnstars around her. Maybe it is hubris, but there is only so much the light can understand of the dark. Maybe, Cal hopes, she has finally found someone who can understand her, too. 

_Walk the path and welcome change or face the knight._

Cal is nowhere and everywhere and the gods are fighting. She stands in the endless plains of nothingness as the gods tower above her. Endlessly bickering. Cal is honored to be here and yet…

This is not what she imagined. This is not what she wanted. The gods are supposed to be powerful, wise. Supposed to lead kith.

And yet they do not know what to do.

And yet they need her.

She is just one mortal, just Cal, and what can she do that the gods cannot? She has already done so much. Maybe Berath should have let her pass on. Let her rest.

The other gods fade away and there is just Berath. “Can I stay with you?”

The Pallid Knight leans down, and Cal can feel her breath on the back of her neck, cold, sending shivers down her spine. “To live is a choice, and you yet draw breath. Drink deep of the air, Watcher. We have work yet to do.”

And then Cal is back in her cabin on The Defiant. Banished, or saved. Her neck is still cool.

_For she walks the road with thee and will guide all to their destination._

They are like two pieces of a puzzle that fit together: the Watcher who can see souls and the priestess helbent on saving them.

Xoti swings her lantern, grim determination on her face. Her composure if offset by the charming way she bites her lips when she is concentration, and Cal doesn’t know if she should be thinking such thoughts. Has never allowed herself to think such thoughts.

But duty comes first, and Xoti’s duty is already taking everything from her. Cal knows about nightmares, visions, tormented sleep. She would not wish it upon anyone, especially not her.

With every soul, Xoti’s lantern grows brighter but she grows dimmer.

They have a duty to the dead. But for the first time, Cal wonders if it should be at the expense of the living.

_Thou mortal, the skull thou wilt become._

Maybe she finds in Xoti the passion she has so long denied herself. Cal kisses her, lips soft and warm and so alive. So alive her chest aches.

She has never done this before. Physically, emotionally. She has dedicated herself to Berath so fully that she has never looked for anyone on the mortal plane. It still feels like a sin, like she is denying Berath some part of herself.

But Cal knows that Berath can never be hers. Xoti is here, hers right here and now.

When Cal dies, she will belong to her god. Right now, she is alive.

_Thou closed off, the key thou shalt turn._

The Wheel is broken.

Cal’s god is now the first among the gods. For that, she should be happy.

But the Wheel is broken.

And Xoti’s god is dead.

Cal is tired. She is tired, she is scared, and she doesn’t know what to say. She stands with Xoti on the deck of The Defiant, staring back at Ukaizo. It turns out that mortals cannot change what the gods cannot.

Xoti also stands in silence. There is a distance between them, now. Or maybe it’s just Cal. Maybe it’s ending. Maybe it could never really continue. Maybe they walked this path together and now they are meant to walk in separate directions.

But why? For once, couldn’t Cal fight the universe for what _she_ wants?

Something has ended, but if she has learned anything from following the god of cycles, that means that something else is just beginning.

_Thou sealed, the threshold thou shalt cross._

She dreams of her death sometimes. Day dreams, night dreams, yearning. Dreams of being old and in bed after a life well lived. At peace. Her lined hands struggle to move the wisps of grey hair from her face. She is alone. Perhaps she should be despondent, but all she feels is relief. Everyone has wanted so much from her. She has given all she has to give. It is time to go home.

She sees her across the room, looming in the doorway. Heavy plate creaks as she strides across the room to Cal’s bedside. Dark eyes peer down at her from sunken sockets, a gaze that is eternal. Cal could get lost in those eyes. She wants to get lost in those eyes.

Her tongue is dry as she opens her mouth. “Shouldn’t you be the Usher?”

The Pallid Knight smiles and her face is ageless. “Aren’t I the one who collects the toll from those that have tarried too long?”

Cal’s bones ache, and there’s an old, familiar ache in her chest. “I never meant to tarry. There was only so much–”

“So much to do,” Berath finishes along with her. “You have done well, Watcher. You have done so much more than anyone should have asked of you.”

Cal eyes the Pallid Knight’s greatsword. “What happens now?”

“Now?” The Pallid Knight kneels down at Cal’s bedside and leans over to look her in the eye.

Cal can feel Berath’s breath on her lips and she knows she is blessed, like that time so long ago. Strange that the gods should have breath, that ancient, immortal beings breathe like any mortal. Such a simple thing, inhaling and exhaling, that one does not need to think of it. Until one does not do it at all.

“Now,” Berath is almost touching her now. “Now it is time to sleep, Calendula.”

She feels her lips softly press against hers, cold. 

Now she is no longer Cal. She is endless.

**Author's Note:**

> Two things:
> 
> 1) The line is actually "For he walks the road with thee" even though it's talking about the Pallid Knight who has always been female so I fixed that.
> 
> 2) The line Berath says is an actual quote from Deadfire that I managed to get in conversation once and never again but I have a screenshot of it so it was real.


End file.
